Nandini to Introduce QR Code to Combat Fake Dairy Products
Karnataka Milk Federation (KMF), under its flagship brand Nandini, will soon embed unique QR codes on all its dairy products to fight counterfeit and adulterated items. Each QR code enables consumers to verify product authenticity via smartphone scan, and the Federation has warned of legal action against falsifiers. KMF currently procures about one crore litres of milk daily, processing approx. 65 lakh litres into milk, curd and other dairy items distributed across Karnataka and exported to Dubai and Singapore.
Industry Insight
The QR-code initiative by Nandini is a strong step toward brand protection, consumer trust and supply-chain transparency. For dairy players, this highlights:- The growing need for traceability mechanisms in consumer dairy products to counter adulteration and fake brands.
- Premium dairy brands must integrate digital authentication tools (QR, NFC, blockchain) as standard practice—especially for exports.
- Cooperatives and processors should view this not just as risk mitigation but as a brand differentiation advantage: invest early in traceability and authenticity features not only to protect, but to market “verified genuine” identity.
- From a cost/operational view: adding QR coding, packaging variation and backend verification platform has modest incremental cost but disproportionately high value in consumer markets with trust concerns.